An Event That Transformed Me: A Dove Fell From Above – Directing Me to a Covert Underground Rescue Network

Our aircraft pushed through layer after layer of sleet on its descent into Manchester. A sense of dread had accompanied me during the journey, growing stronger as I made my way through the arrivals hall. I felt bitter over returning to the place where I had been raised, after residing on the other side of the world for what had felt like a an age.

After a few days, I headed out to get a haircut. My mind was far away, back across an ocean, when I became aware of something hit the sidewalk. I gazed down to see a bird on its wings, splayed out, and trembling.

The fall took place just as children were streaming out from the local elementary school and so within moments a group of little ones had gathered, accompanied by their parents. This group of bemused faces peered down at the bird, not knowing what to think or act. The kids were more certain: “Daddy, she needs a vet, can we call an emergency service?” I took off my anorak, crouched down and scooped the pigeon inside it. “Don’t worry, love, the nice man will take care of her!” remarked one mother with a sigh of relief. I had been transformed into the emergency transport for this pigeon that had just landed abruptly, involuntarily, as I had a couple of days prior.

I trudged home, arms held out, with the bird curled up inside the coat.

I had no idea that my impromptu decision to rescue my feathered charge (the name I chose for my patient) would guide me to a network of Mancunians giving up significant amounts of time to provide not only transport for city pigeons but diagnostic imaging, respite care, and even “bird rehabilitation”.

I found a cardboard box for Belinda, prepared it with an old piece of cloth, and put her inside. Every 20 minutes or so, I’d open the box just long enough for us to awkwardly lock eyes.

Those periods of mutual bewilderment interrupted my hectic search for what to do from there. I called friends for guidance and one suggested trying Facebook, where, to my surprise, I found a bird rehabilitation group, and put in a request to join.

A Community Effort

With a large membership, the group has an organic system: someone in Manchester discovers an ailing pigeon, a heartfelt post is made, then a comment section “assessment” follows. If the bird is deemed in need of an scan, someone with a veterinary contact can organize it; if it needs physio, a “rehabber” will offer to look after the bird.

Carers each have their own finely honed skills, whether it’s repairing broken wings or treating wounds. Their tremendous, collective effort for the pigeons of the city is powered solely by goodwill.

Belinda was promptly assessed with brain trauma, likely a concussion, and matched with a rehabber who would give pain relief and a course of gentle physio. We never discovered exactly what made her to plummet. I assumed the role of pigeon ambulance once more, taking the tram across the city with Belinda in a shoebox on my lap so she could obtain the treatment she deserved.

Rediscovering Home

After stumbling across this secret pigeon “support system”, I began to feel much more positive about being back in my home town. I question any of the places I had called home while away could claim anything comparable. It also struck me that this was not the first time I’d been involved in a pigeon aid mission: almost 20 years earlier I’d observed one drop from the sky into the grounds of my secondary school. Again, children circled the bird, but only one – my closest friend at the time – had the nerve to rescue it and take it to safety.

The individual has since been lost – one of a number of companions to lose their lives in the years before my departure from Manchester. I came to see that this had been a major reason of what had made coming back so painful.

Pigeons as Companions

Pigeons have a longstanding role as “emotional support” animals, especially in the north of England. Laborers started to raise the birds because they gave them comfort and an opportunity to stare at the heavens between long shifts of underground work. During the Depression, workers on the unemployment also found comfort in pigeons, but keeping them was seen as a sign of “social malaise”.

Nowadays, pigeons are often written off as stupid, unclean or a pest. Before finding the rehab group, I had spoken to a veterinarian, who told me: “if you bring it here, leave that in the lot and we’ll put it down.”

The bird? Not our Belinda. Although not expected to ever fly again , she has embraced her newly earthbound life with success in a volunteer’s spare bedroom. Each satisfied call, often caused by her favourite snack, frozen peas, feels like a example in perseverance and fortitude – and I am forever grateful to her for revealing to me a new dimension to the city I believed I understood.